Zoe and I sat and watched the last 25 minutes or so of the 1971 Willy Wonka film and surprisingly with no animated Dora, Diego or Kai-lan ( newest Dora-like clone from China) to be found, she sat still and watched Viloet turn violet and the Oompa Loompas sing a few songs. I got to hear my 2 favorite quotes including, "We are the musicmakers and we are the dreamers of dreams."
I liked the newer Depp version where Depp plays him so oft-kilter and even got it as a freebie for HD-DVD where it looks stunning, but the sentimentality and the nostalgia factor of the 1971 version keeps me coming back. I read the Dahl book to my classroom every year and we usually watch both versions throughout the year.
Wilder just makes the movie for me and even as a children's movie from the early 70's, it is still pretty tweaked. I mean the riverboat section with Wonka manically singing:
"There's no earthly way of knowing / Which direction we are going / There's no knowing where we're rowing / Or which way the river's flowing / Is it raining? / Is it snowing? / Is a hurricane a-blowing? / Not a speck of light is showing / So the danger must be growing / Are the fires of hell a-glowing? / Is the grisly reaper mowing? / Yes, the danger must be growing / 'Cause the rowers keep on rowing / And they're certainly not showing / Any signs that they are slowing."
That ends with Veruca's great line; "What is this, a freak out?" is just classic.
No comments:
Post a Comment